This article investigates the relative importance and variability of the country-of-origin effect
in employee relations approaches of US subsidiaries within the context of diversity of
employee relations patterns in home- and host-country business systems and the influence
of important industry forces. It is based on a representative survey of US subsidiaries and
indigenous firms in the UK. The cross-sectional comparison with indigenous UK firms
confirmed a distinct US country-of-origin imprint in employee relations patterns in US
subsidiaries. However, the magnitude of such an effect cautions against assumptions of
popular stereotypes and reflects, inter alia, the diversity of employee relations approaches
among US parent companies as well as developments in the UK industrial relations landscape
over the last decades. The intra-US analysis revealed the importance of both the level and type
of industry internationalisation in shaping the strength and nature of the country-of-origin
influence. On the basis of the findings, the article highlights lessons to be learned for the study
of cross-border policy-transfer issues in MNCs.

In light of current changes in the German industrial relations¿ landscape and the wider and deeper integration of German
multinationals into the world economy, this study investigates the relative importance of the country-of-origin effect in employee
relations of German affiliates in an Anglo-American setting. The paper addresses important issues that relate to the wider
international business domain. The comparative analysis to US affiliates in the UK and British owned firms points to a distinctively
German flavored hybrid approach that integrates the best practice elements of the US model with the collective orientation of the
German model. This bears a resemblance to an emerging trend in the parent companies¿ home locations. The intra-German analysis
revealed that affiliates of multinationals that face pressures for international integration are at the forefront of this development. The
findings suggest that this might provide a suitable model of international operation for multinationals from strongly institutionalized
countries.

Interest has grown in the significance of the country-of-origin
impact on the Employment Relations (ER) approaches in the international
subsidiaries of Multinational Companies (MNCs). In this article, a comparative
cross-sectional analysis of German subsidiaries with indigenous UK firms will
be provided. The central issues concern the extent to which German MNCs in
deregulated Anglo-American industrial relations settings draw on the German
ER model, adjust to the host-country context or adopt current ¿best practice¿
prescriptions frequently associated with leading US MNCs. Here, the key
questions are: How and to what extent do different industry-specific forces
interrelate with country-of-origin effects and pressures to adopt ¿best practice¿
approaches to shape subsidiary ER outcomes?

This article focuses on the workforce characteristics of the German and UK operations of McDonald’s Corporation. The UK workforce is characterised by predominantly young workers with very limited work experience, the German workforce is much older and mostly foreign workers. The analysis suggests that despite these differences and differences in labour market regulation, there is a key similarity between the workforces. The corporation is able to draw on similarly “weak” and marginalised segments of the labour market and these segments are likely to be particularly acquiescent to managerial prerogative. National institutional arrangements can still constrain the employment relations policies of multinational enterprises (MNEs). However, this analysis supports the notion that there is a growing diversity within national systems increasingly explained by MNE policies and practices. This does not necessarily mean that national systems are becoming redundant, but that there is a dynamic relationship between such systems and the needs of MNEs.

This article analyses the establishment and subsequent meetings of the McDonald's European Works Council and raises a number of questions. Who is an `employee representative' for the purposes of the EU Directive? How are such representatives elected in practice and what roles do existing national sub-structures play? Can employee representatives adequately coordinate their roles in the absence of significant unionisation? The experience of the McDonald's EWC suggests that where workforces have low levels of unionisation and employers are opposed in principle to the prescribed arrangements, a non-union firm can frustrate even the limited aims of the Directive. Furthermore, legally underpinned national-level sub-structures, which are often assumed to make such European-level bodies accountable, may fail to do so in practice.

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